Emil de Cou returns to lead Mobile Symphony Orchestra in 'French Connection' concert

Emil de Cou has fond memories of his last appearance with the Mobile Symphony Orchestra.

That was almost eight years ago (April 2002) when de Cou was guest conductor for the “Mozart & More” concert at the Saenger Theatre. The amiable, articulate de Cou, who had just been named assistant conductor for the National Symphony Orchestra, made a marvelous impression on the Mobile audience.

He was promoted to associate conductor in 2003 and became NSO @ Wolf Trap Festival conductor two years later. Before joining the NSO in 2002, de Cou worked primarily with the San Francisco Ballet and the American Ballet Theatre.

The Saenger Theatre, downtown Mobile’s 82-year-old “jewel on Joachim,” was still three years from the a $4.5 million renovation when de Cou came to town. Still, the city and its grand old vaudeville house made a profound impression.

(Image courtesy CLA Artists)Guest conductor Emil de Cou“I’d spent a lot of time in the South but never in Mobile,” de Cou says by long distance from Los Angeles. “I remember the lady who picked me up drove the scenic route and on this huge boulevard with old (oak) trees. It was very beautiful, and I found Mobile very. very beautiful. The orchestra was terrific and the Saenger Theatre . . . (had) such a nice, distinct personality.”

De Cou’s lone connection to Mobile was his friend and colleague Scott Speck, then in his second season as music director for Mobile Symphony. This time, Speck is busy conducting Joffrey Ballet’s production of Prokofiev’s “Cinderella,” along with a trio of concerts with the Thunder Bay (Ontario) Symphony.

Of course, he turned to de Cou for the MSO’s upcoming evening and matinee performances of French repertoire. De Cou will conduct the MSO’s performances of “French Connection” at 8 p.m. Feb. 27 and 2:30 p.m. Feb. 28 at the Saenger Theatre.

The program includes: Symphonie in D minor, César Franck (1822-90); the Prelude to “L’Apres-midi d’un faune,” Claude Debussy (1862-1918); “Romeo et Juliette: Romeo seul/Fete chez Capulet” by Hector Berlioz (1803-69); and “Boléro” by Maurice Ravel (1875-1937). De Cou knows this music well and has a special affection for it.

“French repertoire has always been particularly close to me,” he says, “especially the music of Debussy.”

Most of his colleagues are crazy for Brahms or Mahler, and that big orchestra repertoire is OK, says de Cou, “but I could care less about Mahler.”

However, Debussy’s “Afternoon of a Faun” is “quietly poetic and intense, and about nine minutes long,” he says. “That’s all I need for a week to make me happy.”

Next weekend’s concerts offer a great deal more, such as Franck’s Symphonie. (Franck was Belgian but spent much of his career in Paris. Naturally, the French claim him.)

“The French were not great symphonists,” he says, “which is a national personality trait. The Germans excelled in the symphonic repertoire, and the Russians not as much. With the French, there are not as many long, architectural pieces.

"But here you get this great, sprawling French/Liszt interpretation of a symphony, which has all the hallmarks of great French music — beautiful harmonies, and it is very melodic.”

The second half of the program opens with the balcony scene from Berlioz’ “Romeo and Juliet,” which de Cou describes as a hybrid — “not quite an opera, not quite an oratorio. It’s a kind of epic staged concert opera.”

“It’s extremely tuneful, and one can imagine it being staged as a pantomime or as a ballet. It’s so cinemagraphic.”

The evening’s showpiece, of course, is Ravel’s “Boléro,” which de Cou characterizes as “an exercise in orchestral color of one tune in one beat. It’s like one 15-minute crescendo.”

Music and movie lovers of a certain age will recall, vividly, the use of “Boléro” in Blake Edwards’ 1979 movie “10,” in which a tanned, swimsuited Bo Derek helps Dudley Moore through his midlife crisis. It was music for the eyes.

“What I love most about French music is its sensuality,” says de Cou, “and of course that was lampooned a little in the movie. But it’s an extremely sensual piece. . . . It is seemingly static when you look at it on paper, but it comes alive in an unbelievable way.”

De Cou says he likes having a sense of the larger architecture of a piece.

“The great thing with ‘Boléro’ is that it’s an orchestral showpiece for everybody,” he says.

“You have the same tune over and over again, but you want it with the individual voice. You want to hear the flutes’ personality; you want to hear the clarinets, the bassoon, the trombone. You want to hear what they bring. You’ll hear them as people through these tunes, and then it comes together at the end.”

“The rhythm itself doesn’t change and that is the underpinning and power of this piece,” he says. “It’s almost unnerving, like staring at someone a long time. It’s a beautiful tune with this perfumey melody up above and harmonies, but the rhythm stays constant.

“In a way, you don’t really need to conduct like you would the other pieces on the program,” he says. “You’re just kind of there to oversee. Then at the very end you bring in the brass and it finally changes key — and that’s where the conductor comes in. Otherwise, it’s very chamber-like.”